Prosecutors on Monday rested their case against a 23-year-old on trial for murder in the 2014 Lookout Valley triple homicide.
But they spent most of the afternoon discussing a pair of questions: Would Derek Morse testify? And, if so, could prosecutors ask him about pictures of the alleged murder weapons that authorities downloaded from his cellphone?
Absolutely not, said Morse’s defense attorney, Dan Ripper.
The state had Morse’s cellphone for more than three years, but prosecutors only turned the photos over a day before trial, Ripper said.
Judge Barry A. Steelman talks to prospective jurors for the Lookout Valley trial involving defendant Derek Morse on Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2017.“If I get this one month ago, I can have a technical analysis done and figure out if that’s an image received or taken; I don’t have any way in the world to do that now,” Ripper said. “And I didn’t have any way in the world to do that Monday when I received it.